


like my mirror years ago

by ohmygodwhy



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Character Study, Developing Friendships, Gen, Implied Relationships, M/M, Missing Scene, keith: i have a fist....u have a face.....interesting, lotor: im half galra......ur half galra.......interesting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-04
Updated: 2018-03-04
Packaged: 2019-03-26 09:21:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,026
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13854807
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ohmygodwhy/pseuds/ohmygodwhy
Summary: He’s almost managed to forget the prince is there at all, when he says, “I saved your life, you know.”Keith does know.“You ruined my death, is what you did,” he says, only half serious. Because he knows, but he doesn’t have to admit it.





	like my mirror years ago

**Author's Note:**

> so i watched s5 in one sitting and i actually rlly liked it even tho it was so jammed packed and kinda rushed. unfortunately, lotor and keith didn't actually talk to each other once................so here i am w no self-restraint
> 
> alt title: the lotor & keith interactions i deserve
> 
> (spoilers for s5 obviously)

 

Keith watches him raise his arms in surrender and accept the cuffs Shiro snaps onto his wrists, Allura hovering a few feet away, arms crossed over her chest. He looks proud of himself, but also like he’s trying not to be, the way Lance gets when Shiro or Allura tell him he did good on that mission, was right about this other thing. But this isn’t the same kind. Lance never really has ulterior motives, other than wanting to be complimented. Keith may not be good at reading people, but he’s not stupid enough to think that the prince of the Galra Empire saved all their lives out of the goodness of his heart.

He’s still riding the last of the adrenaline high from his latest near-death experience. He thinks there’s a certain peace in knowing exactly how you’re going to die, even if it’s not ideal. Shiro shoots him the vaguest of concerned looks as he walks by, and a pointed head-tilt that means they’re going to talk about it later. Keith frowns. It’s not like he woke up this morning thinking ‘I’m going to ram myself into a giant barrier and die to save the lives of everyone I love’. These things just happen to him.

The prince — Lotor, he knows, the one who chased them around and drove him crazy during his brief stint as Black Paladin — catches his eye as he walks by. He looks like he wants to say something, maybe, but thinks better of it and shuts his mouth.

The adrenaline is nearly gone now, and he’s physically exhausted and probably mentally fucked, but Lotor looks at him like he’s sizing him up, so Keith stares right back. Lotor raises his eyebrows, just a bit, and Keith looks away first.

He blames it on almost dying.

*

He and Shiro don’t talk about it later, because there’s the whole frantic discussion of what the hell they’re gonna do with the prince of the Galran Empire and if they should just kill him, which Allura refuses (but just barely) because they’re ‘not as bad as their enemies’, Lance keeps shooting the guy dirty looks and Shiro is saying they should get some rest and think this through with an edge to his voice that was never there before.

The entire time, Lotor stands in the background, cuffs around his wrists, looking as complacent and unassuming as possible and more willing to do anything than Keith’s ever seen anyone be. He doesn’t say a single goddamn thing. Keith doesn’t either, because he may be a part of the Voltron Coalition or whatever they’re calling it, but he’s not a paladin now. He doesn’t think his opinions mean much anymore. He listens when Shiro or Allura says something, and he watches Lotor.

Lotor catches him watching. Because he’s crazy enough to save all his enemies and willingly be taken prisoner, Lotor watches back.

Quietly and slowly, he slides his way over to where Keith is leaning on the wall, arms crossed. He crosses them tighter.

“Keith, is it?” he asks. He says it quietly, but his voice is still sharp and demands attention. Keith doesn’t like it. He also wonders if all aliens have vaguely British accents, or if it’s just ones with pointy ears.

“Don’t remember introducing myself,” he says after a pause just long enough to seem like he doesn’t care about anything that comes out of the prince’s mouth.

Lotor tilts his head a little, which might be his version of a shrug. Maybe a normal shrug isn’t dignified enough for a prince. “You didn’t. I’ve seen a few of the, what is it called, Voltron Coalition performances? With the way the princess portrayed you, you’re quite different from what I expected.”

“And what’s that?” Keith asks despite himself.

“You were the one piloting the Black Lion when I first encountered Voltron, correct?” he asks instead of answering the question.

Keith shifts his footing, tilting his body away defensively, reflexively. The prince had played him like a goddamn flute and taken advantage of his inexperience back then. He was a bad Black Paladin. “Maybe,” he says.

“And that was you about to sacrifice yourself as well,” it isn’t a question this time.

“If that’s what you wanna call it.”

“What would you call it?”

Keith shrugs, turning his attention to whoever’s speaking. It’s Lance, so he has trouble paying attention. “Doing the right thing? Not letting everyone die?”

“Sacrificing yourself for the greater good,” Lotor adds, like Keith cares about his opinion at all. “It was very noble of you.”

Keith snorts, “Sure.”

A pause. Shiro glances over at him, tilting his head at Lotor in silent question. Keith shrugs. Shiro nods, and looks away. He doesn’t press or walk over or ask again, not like he would have before. Keith tries not to notice this.

He’s almost managed to forget the prince is there at all, when he says, “I saved your life, you know.”

Keith does know.

“You ruined my death, is what you did,” he says, only half serious. Because he knows, but he doesn’t have to admit it.

Lotor smiles, of all things, a little twitch of his lips that Keith sees from the corner of his eye, like Keith made a joke. He says nothing else.

When they finally decide that they’ll stick Lotor in some cell somewhere for the time being, the prince goes without protest. He’s their prisoner, but Keith can’t help feeling like he’s got them right where he wants them.

*

Keith only stops by his cell — room? a little thing enclosed in something like glass, with zero privacy and a whole lot of nothing to do — once before he leaves with the Blade again.

He doesn’t know why he visits. Most of the others have, even if it was just to hover anxiously around Shiro or Allura or Coran while they questioned him, so he guesses he might as well.

Lotor doesn’t perk up when he sees him, but he looks more interested than he did staring at the wall. “Keith,” he says like a greeting. Keith doesn’t know whether to call him Prince, or Lotor, or Shady Motherfucker I Don’t Trust But Have A Grudging Respect For, so he just calls him nothing.

“Why’d you save us?” he asks when the silence drags for a few moments. It’s not what he meant to ask, but he asks it anyways. He’s never been good with tact.

“I wanted to form an alliance,” Lotor answers.

“Why?”

“My father’s war has gone on long enough. It’s tearing the universe apart and ruining our empire. We need to end it.” he sounds honest enough, and it puts Keith’s teeth on edge in a way that makes him anxious.

“Why’re you giving us information on your empire if you want to save it? You’re essentially attacking your own people.”

“I’m helping _you_ attack the cruel and violent soldiers who are blindly loyal to my father and his destruction,” he says. His voice is cool and serious. “I’m saving my people.”

“And yourself, right?” Lotor almost looks surprised, for a moment there, “I heard your dad sent out a message saying you’re wanted for treason or something.”

Lotor is quiet for a moment, “Of course I’m looking out for what’s in my best interest. You can’t fault me for that — everyone wants to save themselves.” he pauses, and looks at Keith, searching, “Except for you, it seems.”

“You don’t know anything about me.” Keith says.

“I know you’re Galra,” Lotor says; Keith does his best not to react, but he’s never been good at acting, either. “You fight like one. Victory or death. You wouldn’t give up your fight against me. And you wouldn’t give up the chance to save your little group of rebels.”

“I’m not—” _not Galra?_ He can’t say that, because it’s not true. But he’s not all Galra, either.

“You’re a half breed,” Lotor says, like he can read his stupid thoughts. “You don’t look Galra. But you fight like one. And you fight _with_ them, too.”

Keith is still dressed like a Blade. Because he’s leaving again soon. It’s a cheap shot so really, fuck this guy.

“I’m not like you,” he says, because he’s not good with people and he’s shit at chess because he can’t plot five or ten moves ahead, but he can see what Lotor is trying to do with this. He fights with the Galra, Lotor fights with the rebels. _Parallels, trust me because we’re similar_.

Lotor looks amused, the fucker. “I might look Galra, but that’s not all I am.”

Keith does not want to care. He does not want to care that Prince Lotor is only half Galra and that he fights with a sword and that he’s trying to ‘promote peace’ and ‘end the war’ or lay his cards out to show that they’re ‘not that different after all’.

He can’t say that he doesn’t care, because he was the one of the first ones to jump on the ‘not all Galra are evil monsters’ train. Also, because he’s Galra, and he’s here, and this is another person who is Galra but not all the way and trying his best to either not be an evil monster or is just very good at pretending. (Sometimes, Keith looks at himself and doesn’t know which one he is, either.)

“I’m not like you,” he says again. With the way Lotor looks at him, like he just won something, Keith doesn’t think he’s convinced either of them.

He doesn’t visit Lotor a second time.

*

He does save his life, though. It’s mainly just coincidence, because he’s trying to save Shiro’s life more than he is Lotor’s, but in the moment Shiro has a giant magic lion to protect him, and Lotor does not.

Lotor is heavier than he expected, and he already knows his back is going to be all bruised up from tumbling down like fifty feet of stairs wrapped up in Galra prince, but they live. Lotor tosses him his sword, gives him this wicked smile, and sprints back up the stairs like he didn’t almost get blown up.

At the end of it all, a few of the nasty higher ups are dealt with and Lotor lights the flame and officially becomes Emperor —because oh right, Lotor killed his evil father and Keith wasn’t even there to see it — so the Blade’s mission wasn’t a complete disaster. Shiro lives. Grips his hand tight and pulls him into a quick hug that is comforting but distant and tells him good job, Keith, that was some quick thinking, even though Keith barely thought anything more than _bombs kill people_ and _don’t let the bombs kill Shiro._

Shiro doesn’t give anymore thought to it. Nobody talks about how he apparently did all of this without the others’ agreement. Keith is worried, but he is also busy, and Shiro doesn’t need him right now, and neither does the team, and maybe they never did. He pushes those thoughts aside, because they aren’t important and he doesn’t need them.

“You care for him,” Lotor says; Keith does his very best not to jump.

“Of course I do,” he snaps, “So what?”

“So, why did you leave?”

Keith frowns. He watches Shiro interact with the team, and Matt, and a few Galra officials. “He thought I would be a good leader. And then I wasn’t, so he doesn’t think that anymore.”

Lotor hums thoughtfully. “That’s it?”

“That’s it.” Keith says, and tries not to feel like he’s lying.

“He cares for you, too,” Lotor says, like he knows anything. Maybe he does.

“I know. But he doesn’t need me.”

Lotor is quiet. Keith looks at him. He seems tired; his hair is matted and dirty and his uniform is torn. He’s just fought the battle to become Emperor, Keith supposes. Victory or death. Lotor chose victory.

“I saved your life, you know,” Keith says, only mocking a little bit.

Instead of biting back, Lotor does that head tilt thing, mouth twitching a little, and says, “Yes. I suppose you did.”

 

**Author's Note:**

> ive been sick for almost two whole weeks pls comment to help me get better


End file.
